A Hero Never Dies

Jack and Martin are hired guns working for two rival crime bosses in Hong Kong. For nearly a year they have fought each other on their employers' behalf, even as a mutual respect grows between them. When the two kingpins agree to a truce, both men are cast aside by the organisations they served. Rather than accept their fate, Jack and Martin join forces and turn against the gangsters who used them.

This 1998 action crime thriller was directed by Johnnie To and written by Yau Nai-Hoi and Szeto Kam-Yuen, with To producing alongside Wai Ka-Fai for Milkyway Image and Film City. It is the eighth of the twenty-three films To has directed, arriving between The Longest Nite and Running Out of Time. Leon Lai plays Jack and Lau Ching-wan plays Martin, with Fiona Leung, Yoyo Mung, Lam Suet and Sato Keiji in supporting roles.

The film runs 98 minutes. On IMDb it holds a rating of 7 out of 10 from roughly 1,500 votes, while on TMDB it stands at 6.9 out of 10 from about 60 votes. The larger IMDb sample and the narrower gap between the two scores point to a fairly consistent response, with the relatively modest vote counts suggesting a following concentrated among Hong Kong crime cinema enthusiasts rather than a broad mainstream audience.